Glossary of Mold Terms (From Fungal Contamination: A Manual for Investigation, Remediation and Control)
Air Infiltration Device: device used to clean or “scrub” particulate matter from the air. They consist of a portable unit that contains a fan (which pulls air through the unit) and a series of filters which includes a HEPA filter and a pre-filter.
Air Scrubbers: same as air filtration devices.
Allergens: substances that act as antigens producing an allergy.
Antibiotic: capable of inhibiting or destroying life. A substance produced by a microorganism that affects other microorganisms.
Antigens: a substance, which provokes the formation of an antibody when it is introduced into another organism.
Antimicrobial: inhibits the growth and survival of microscopic living things.
Aspergillus: genus of common molds causing food spoilage; some are pathogenic to plants and animals.
Bacillus: aerobic rod-shaped spore-producing bacterium; often occurring in
chainlike formations.
Bacteria: microorganisms. Single-celled or non-cellular spherical, spiral, or rod-shaped organisms lacking chlorophyll that reproduce by fission; important as pathogens and for biochemical properties; taxonomy is difficult; often considered plants.
Basidiomycetes: a large class of the most highly developed fungi, predominately sexual in their mode of reproduction and possessing a basidium.
Bioaerosol: a heterogeneous mixture of gaseous and particulate matter having a biological origin.
Biocides: chemical agents, such as a pesticide, that is capable of destroying living organisms.
Calibrated: to check, adjust, or determine by comparison with a standard;
generally applied to instruments or measuring devices.
Carbohydrates: neutral compounds of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen formed by green plants, including sugars, starches, and cellulose.
Carbon Dioxide (CO2): a metabolic byproduct of carbohydrate metabolism.
Carbon dioxide collects in the tissues, is cleared by the blood and removed from the body via the lungs when we exhale air.
Carcinogenic: causing or tending to cause cancer.
Cladosporium: a deuteromycetous fungal genus including some economically important plant parasites.
Cladosporium Sphaerospermum: found as a secondary invader of plants, food, soil, paint, and textiles. Widely distributed in air and rotten organic material, and are frequently isolated as a contaminant on foods. One of the most common airborne fungi. Only occasionally associated with disease in humans.
Condensate: atmospheric moisture that has condensed because of cold
temperatures.
Cross-Contamination: passing microorganisms or particulate indirectly from one location to another, generally through the use of improper sterilization or cleaning procedures, unclean instruments or equipment, or recycling of products or equipment.
Deuteromycetes: a class of fungi known as imperfect fungi. The members of this class, which includes Penicillium and Aspergillus and other fungi important in medicine and food science, all lack a sexual state but are otherwise unrelated to each other.
Dew-point temperature: a measure of absolute humidity. The temperature at which, the partial pressure of the water vapor is equal to the saturated vapor pressure of water at that temperature.
Dissemination: the act of dispersing or diffusing or spreading something.
Dry-bulb: the measure of the amount of sensible heat contained within the air.
Enzymes: any of numerous proteins or conjugated proteins produced by living organisms and functioning as biochemical catalysts.
Ethylene oxide: a colorless flammable toxic compound C2 H4O used especially in synthesis and in sterilization and fumigation.
Exacerbates: making something that is already bad, worse.
Formaldehydes: a colorless gaseous compound, HCHO, the simplest aldehydes, used for manufacturing melamine and phenolic resins, fertilizers, dyes, and embalming fluids and in aqueous solution as a preservative and disinfectant.
Fungicide: kills fungi in any stage of the growth but does not kill the spores.
Fungus fungi (pl): organisms that absorb food in solution directly through their cell walls and reproduce through spores. None conduct photo-syntheses.
Genus genera (pl): a taxonomic category ranking below a family and above a species and generally consisting of a group of species exhibiting similar characteristics. In taxonomic nomenclature the genus name is used, either alone or followed by a Latin adjective or epithet, to form the name of a species.
Hypha: an individual fungal thread or filament of connected cells; the thread that represents the individual parts of the fungal body.
Hypothesis: a tentative theory about the natural world; a concept that is not yet verified but that if true would explain certain facts or phenomena.
Industrial Hygienist: a person who is concerned primarily with the recognition, evaluation and control of the environmental factors or occupational health hazards in work-related environments.
Microbial Growth: the activity and growth of microorganisms such as bacteria, algae, diatoms, plankton, and fungi.
Mycotoxins: toxic compounds produced by certain fungi, some of which are used for medicinal purposes.
Off Gas: to release gasses, generally VOCs into the air.
Parameters: limitation, boundaries or properties which define something.
Particulate: composed of distinct particles.
Pathogens: disease producing organisms that can exist in many different places.
Plenum: air compartment or chamber made of duct boards, metal, drywall or wood that distributes air to individual ducts, or is part of the air distribution system.
Pseudomonas: the most important member of the group, Pseudomonas syringae, is a gram-negative rod. It causes Bacterial Stem Canker in stone fruits and dozens of other diseases. It is also an important ice nucleating bacterium in our atmosphere.
Psychrometrics: the science of understanding how moisture behaves when it is a vapor which is contained within air.
Relative Humidity: the ratio of the amount of water in the air at a given temperature to the maximum amount it could hold at that temperature; expressed as a percentage.
Remediate: the process of restoring, repairing; regarding mold damage in buildings, the process includes removing damaged materials, replacing them with new materials and correcting the problems that caused the problem.
Rhizopus: any genus of mold fungi including some economically valuable forms and some plant or animal pathogens (as a bread mold). Any of various rot-causing fungi of the genus Rhizopus.
Risk Assessment: the identification and quantification of the risk resulting from a specific condition (e.g. the use or occurrence of a chemical, taking into account the possible harmful effects on individual people or society of using the chemical in the amount and manner proposed and all the possible routes of exposure).
Scrubbers: air filtration devices used to clean or “scrub” the air of particulate.
Spores: the reproductive elements of lower organisms, such as protozoa fungi, and cryptogrammic plants.
Substrate: the substance acted upon by an enzyme or ferment. Any stratum lying underneath another.
Threshold limit values (TLVs): guidelines set by ACGIH.
Toxic Mold: general terminology often used to create concern over the presence of fungi that may or may not cause adverse health effects to people.
Vapor Pressure: the pressure exerted by a vapor; often understood to mean saturated vapor pressure (the pressure of a vapor in contact with its liquid form).
Variable Air Volume (VAV): air distribution system that modulates the volume of air delivered.
Velocity: rapidity or speed of motion; swiftness.
Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs): chemicals which vaporize at room temperature.
Wet-Bulb: a thermometer with a bulb that is covered with moist muslin; used in a psychrometer to measure humidity.
Yeast: any of various single-celled fungi that reproduce asexually by budding or division.
Zygomycetes: division of fungi having sexually produced zygospores.